I. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to an adaptive control circuit for use with a machine performance optimizing system, and more specifically to an event timing device, responsive to the direction signals provided by the optimizing system for generating an event signal at a desired point in time.
II. Description of the Prior Art
In a co-pending application, Ser. No. 845,804, filed Oct. 27, 1977 (now U.S. Pat. No. 4,130,863) and entitled OPTIMIZING CONTROL SYSTEM there is described a digital electronic control system for optimizing the performance of an energy consuming system wherein a given parameter is perturbated and the resulting effect on the machine or system performance is computed for producing a control signal which is used to adjust the parameter setting in a way tending to improve the output performance of the energy consuming system. This optimizing control system samples the effect on the performance of the machine with which it is used of a small, incremental change in the setting of a control parameter and the information obtained from the sampling process is used to adjust the setting in a way which tends to optimize the system performance.
When applied to an internal combustion engine environment such as that used in an automobile, incremental changes may be made in the distributor setting. The optimizing unit of the aforementioned Schweitzer et al patent employs a counting process to determine whether the incremental change or dithering of the control parameter results in an increase or a decrease in engine RPM. If during the dithering the machine appears to have gained speed during the "advance" portion of the dither cycle, then the optimizer unit responds by producing a control signal directing an additional advance in the parameter setting. However, if the counting process indicates that the machine suffered a speed decrease due to the incremental adjustment in the advance direction, then the optimizer unit responds by producing a control signal indicating that the setting should be retarded in order to improve performance.
A further understanding of the operation and construction of an optimizing control system with which the present invention finds utility may be obtained by a reading of the aforementioned Schweitzer et al application and the patents referred to therein.
The present invention is a digital circuit which accepts the "advance" and "retard" outputs from the optimizing control system and produces a control signal at the appropriate point of time in the engine's operation so that the improved performance of the engine can be attained. When applied in the environment of an internal combustion engine, the circuit of the present invention may receive pulse signals from the breaker points of the distributor and produce a firing pulse to the spark plugs at a precise time as determined by the optimizing control system.